The Matt Walsh Show - Ep. 379 - The War On Facts

00:00:00.280 Okay, welcome to the show, everybody. Feeling pretty good today, personally. My Baltimore

00:00:04.500 Ravens demolished the Rams last night on Monday Night Football. I don't know if you watched

00:00:07.640 that. And you know, I was thinking last night as I was watching it all unfold, on top of

00:00:12.460 everything else, I love how the Ravens are named after an Edgar Allan Poe poem, because

00:00:18.480 Poe lived in Baltimore, died in Baltimore. He also married his 13-year-old cousin in

00:00:23.800 Baltimore, which we don't really talk about that part of it, that part we leave to the

00:00:26.940 side. But the point is that Baltimore Raven refers obviously to the poem, the Raven, which

00:00:34.000 is why their mascots, the Raven mascots, are named Edgar Allan and Poe, so it's very subtle.

00:00:38.980 And I remember when the Ravens came to Baltimore in 1995, when we stole the team from Cleveland,

00:00:45.640 which was fine, because our team had been stolen by Indianapolis in the 80s, and so we turned

00:00:51.260 around and stole our team from Cleveland. And you know, fair is fair. If you get something

00:00:56.560 stolen, you could steal from the next person. That's the way it goes in America. And anyway,

00:01:02.140 so there was a poll, a vote, to see, you know, what we would name the new team, and everybody

00:01:07.660 in this city was voting. And as a kid at the time, I wanted something like the dragons, you

00:01:15.980 know, something fierce, like the dragons, or the butchers, the Baltimore butchers, that would

00:01:21.000 have been good. But the nerds wanted a 19th century literary reference, and they won. And

00:01:29.500 I was mad at the time, but I appreciate it now, because now that I'm older and I'm a

00:01:34.340 nerd myself, I really appreciate the literary reference every time I watch football. Great

00:01:38.140 stuff. Okay, speaking of nerds, Pete Buttigieg, he's a nerd, which I mean as a compliment. Smart

00:01:45.640 guy, obviously. Rhodes Scholar. I don't know if you heard about the fact that he's a Rhodes

00:01:50.480 Scholar. We're only reminded of that every time he does a debate. But probably the most

00:01:55.600 talented politician the Democrats have right now. And that, I don't, that's not, that's

00:02:02.220 half a compliment and half an insult. I think he's wrong about everything. I also think that

00:02:08.140 he's cynical and manipulative, especially in how he slanders Christians while pretending 0.97

00:02:13.480 to be one. So I'm not a fan of his by any stretch of the imagination. But he is smart 0.77

00:02:17.580 and he's good at what he does as a political candidate. But he was trending on Twitter this

00:02:23.000 morning in a not so positive way. In fact, the phrase, Pete Buttigieg is a lying MF was 0.54

00:02:30.300 trending. And that's about as bad of a trend as you can get, I think, as a political candidate.

00:02:38.340 That's the title of an article in The Root. And it's an article that just, you know,

00:02:43.480 blasts away at Buttigieg, calling him a lying mother blank, basically painting him as nothing 0.97

00:02:51.080 more than a lucky, privileged, spoiled, lying brat, essentially, and taking issue. And this, 0.98

00:02:58.920 of course, is from the left. This is an attack on him from the left, taking issue mainly with

00:03:04.740 something that he said about, about, something he said about eight years ago while he was running

00:03:09.340 for mayor of South Bend. And he was talking about disadvantaged kids and the education system.

00:03:17.160 And anyway, they're taking issue with what he said. And take a listen to it right here.

00:03:21.560 You know, the kids need to see evidence that education is going to work for them, right?

00:03:25.620 So you see a lot of parts of town.

00:03:26.980 That's part of the motivation.

00:03:27.920 Yeah, because you're motivated because you believe that at the end of your educational

00:03:32.560 process, there's a reward, there's a stable life, there's a job. And there are a lot of

00:03:37.020 kids, especially the lower income minority neighborhoods, who literally just haven't seen

00:03:41.960 it work. There isn't somebody they know personally who testifies to the value of education.

00:03:47.680 So yeah, you bet.

00:03:48.860 That's what this writer at The Root is mad about. And that's what makes him a lying MF. 0.96

00:03:55.140 A bunch of leftists are also mad, it seems. Now, the question is, what was wrong with what 0.96

00:04:03.980 he said? You know, far be it for me to defend Buttigieg, but what did he say that was wrong

00:04:09.960 there? What's the wrong part of that? Well, this guy at The Root says that the problem is

00:04:18.580 not about bad role models, despite what Buttigieg claims. It's not a lack of role models. It's

00:04:24.760 about minority neighborhoods being neglected, underfunded, schools in the inner city being

00:04:30.920 underfunded, and racism, and all of these external circumstances, you see. And the thing

00:04:36.760 with Buttigieg is he just got lucky, and that's why he's been successful. And so for him to

00:04:40.920 sit there in judgment is racist and wrong, and it's deceptive. But of course, that's all

00:04:48.360 nonsense. The big advantage that Buttigieg had is that he had a mother and father growing

00:04:54.640 up. Okay, that is a big advantage. That's not luck, though. That's not a roll of the

00:05:01.040 dice. The mother and father chose, decided to be present. That's a choice they made. It's

00:05:08.260 not luck. The point is that in the inner city, you're talking about 70 or 80 percent of the

00:05:16.140 kids don't have a dad in the picture. 70 or 80 percent. Now, of course, that's going to

00:05:23.700 have an enormous impact. Of course, that's going to mean a dearth of male role models,

00:05:29.200 especially for boys who have a special need for male role models in their lives. They need

00:05:34.960 a man to show them how to be a man. And it's much easier and better and more effective

00:05:43.060 if you have that example in your life that you can look to. It's kind of the show-don't-tell

00:05:48.940 thing. You could tell kids all day long this is how you're supposed to act, but you need

00:05:53.640 someone there to show you how to act, someone that they can emulate. Now, this is all really

00:06:01.480 obvious, and to deny it is madness. It's not bad luck. Fathers abandoning their families

00:06:08.260 are not unlucky, okay, unless they died. But if they're still alive and they've abandoned

00:06:15.640 their families, they chose to do that. They chose not to be there for their kids. Or if

00:06:23.740 they're in prison or something, they chose to commit a crime. It's not luck. It's a choice

00:06:29.980 made by those fathers. So you've got a huge amount of men in the inner city who conceive

00:06:39.700 children and then don't stick around to raise them. That is a statistical reality. The article

00:06:46.240 says, just reading a little bit from this article in the root, it says, it proves men like him,

00:06:52.660 Buttigieg, are more willing to perpetuate the fantastic narrative of Negro neighborhoods 0.95

00:06:57.820 needing more role models and briefcase carriers than make the people in power stare into the sun 0.89

00:07:04.960 and see the blinding light of racism. Get-along moderates would rather make crap up out of whole 0.96

00:07:11.260 cloth than wade into the waters of reality. Pete Buttigieg doesn't want to change anything. He just 0.92

00:07:17.080 wants to be something. This is not just a lie of omission. It is a dangerous precedent.

00:07:21.960 This is why institutional inequality persists, not because of white hoods and racial slurs.

00:07:27.760 It is because this insidious double talk erases the problem by camouflaging it because it is painted

00:07:33.300 as a problem of black lethargy and not white apathy. He's saying that he's making stuff up. He's making

00:07:38.840 crap up. Actually, he said he's making S up. What is he making up? What? Okay, here's the question. 1.00

00:07:47.300 Is the fatherless rate very high in the inner city or not? Yes or no? Answer is yes. Unless we're going

00:07:58.280 to say 70% isn't very high. Another question. Are kids without fathers at a huge disadvantage?

00:08:06.640 And do they lack essential male leadership and an essential male role model in their life?

00:08:12.360 The answer is yes. Question. Do men who conceive children and then not stick around to raise them 0.83

00:08:19.560 make that choice because of racism? Is it racism that prevents them from raising their own kids?

00:08:27.180 Answer is no. So where is Buttigieg wrong? You know, I don't have a dog in this fight. I'm not a fan,

00:08:35.240 like I said, of Buttigieg, but the truth is the truth. And this is a truth that we need to be able

00:08:41.880 to talk about. And when it comes to the fatherless problem, by the way, it's not just a problem in the

00:08:49.960 black community. It's a problem, and I don't have the numbers right in front of me, but if you're 1.00

00:08:55.880 talking about, especially in the inner city, like I said, 70 or 80%, even in white neighborhoods,

00:09:01.720 in the suburbs, it's not that high, but it's a lot higher than it should be. So this is a problem

00:09:10.140 across the board in America. I would say this is a cultural problem shared across the board

00:09:15.720 to one degree or another is a lack of male leadership in the home and a lack of the influence

00:09:24.760 of fathers. Listen, every time or most of the times when we've had a school shooting, a mass shooting,

00:09:32.720 this is one of the things that some of us talk about, that I talk about. 0.91

00:09:36.440 And very often the kids who do that are white. But you know what else you find very often 0.92

00:09:43.000 is that those kids didn't have dads in the home. Not in every case, but in many of them,

00:09:47.780 in most of them. So obviously we need to talk about that.

00:09:54.240 And to insist that we focus the conversation entirely around these sort of external environmental

00:10:05.720 things, racism and all of that. And we make people the victim of their own choices. And

00:10:15.340 when I say that, I'm not referring to the kids in the inner city who grew up without a dad.

00:10:20.000 They're not a victim of their own choice. They're a victim of the choice their father made.

00:10:26.360 And when you read articles like this, it sounds like we're trying to take those fathers who

00:10:30.600 abandoned their children and make those fathers victims of their own choice of abandoning their

00:10:35.040 families. And that's just, that's just wrong. Now, politically, this shows why the Democrats,

00:10:42.800 I think, might be doomed. They're tearing their most talented candidates apart.

00:10:54.260 Nobody's allowed to rise to the top of the pack without being ripped to shreds.

00:10:58.640 The SJWs have this purity test that nobody can pass. Even a young gay man like Buttigieg can't pass it. 0.98

00:11:04.800 Kamala Harris, a black woman, can't pass it. Elizabeth Warren, a female socialist, can't pass it. 0.99

00:11:09.720 Who can pass it? Nobody can pass it. So they all get eaten alive by their own people. And Trump just 0.53

00:11:16.060 sits back and enjoys the show. So it's working out for really well for Trump. I agree with what

00:11:21.520 Tucker Carlson said, I think last night, where he said that he still wouldn't count Michelle Obama out.

00:11:26.340 And I think that that is their only hope. And I wouldn't count her out either. I think Michelle

00:11:31.160 Obama on the left is basically untouchable or the closest thing to untouchable among leftists that you

00:11:37.260 can get. Probably the one person in the whole country who could unite all of these disparate

00:11:42.380 warring factions on the left. You're not going to see any Michelle Obama is a lying MF articles about 1.00

00:11:49.020 her. That's that level of disrespect and that kind of attack is reserved for people like Buttigieg. 1.00

00:11:56.440 You're not going to see that Michelle Obama. There's a reverence that they all, all the leftists

00:12:01.060 seem to have for her. She also has some appeal in the middle as well. So I think she'd be a 1.00

00:12:05.620 formidable general election candidate. I think that's maybe their only hope right now.

00:12:12.160 I just don't see anyone else. Obviously, someone's getting nominated among the Democrats, but

00:12:17.400 they're all going to come into the general election extremely wounded after all of the slings and

00:12:24.720 arrows they've taken from their own side. And that works again to Trump's advantage. Okay. Speaking of

00:12:30.280 people getting attacked for speaking basic facts, I have another example of that that I want to share.

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00:13:56.060 promo code Walsh. Okay, so as I said, speaking of the left's war on facts, journalist Andy Ngo,

00:14:04.820 he's best known for his run-ins with Antifa. He's the guy that got assaulted, sent to the hospital

00:14:10.860 with a brain injury by Antifa a few months ago. Something that, by the way, Democrat candidates

00:14:17.760 still have not condemned. That's a real attack on the press, on a journalist. Hasn't been condemned.

00:14:23.600 Media didn't condemn it. Democrats didn't condemn it. Well, he is now suspended by Twitter for relaying

00:14:32.680 an objective fact and relaying it in an objective and dispassionate way.

00:14:43.120 He shared some verifiable statistical information, and for that he was banned.

00:14:49.160 Now, it started with a tweet from Chelsea Clinton. Chelsea Clinton tweeted, 0.98

00:14:54.620 since 2013, more than 150 trans people have been murdered in the U.S., the majority black

00:14:59.700 transgender women. On TDOR 2019, I guess that's the Trans Day of Remembrance, they call it,

00:15:09.900 we remember and honor the lives lost, hold their loved ones in our hearts, and must commit to doing

00:15:16.820 all we can to end this epidemic of violence and hate. Now, Clinton is connecting this with hate,

00:15:25.940 obviously insinuating, claiming that these are all or mostly hate crimes. Throwing in the black

00:15:33.600 transgender woman detail, mentioning the race, also tries to turn it racial. So the idea is to 0.80

00:15:41.600 make it seem like there are a bunch of racist transphobes out there murdering black, quote, 1.00

00:15:46.880 trans women left and right. Now, Andy Ngo responded saying, and this is what got him banned, or at least 0.98

00:15:54.400 suspended, the U.S. is one of the safest countries for trans people. The murder rate of trans victims is

00:16:00.340 actually lower than that for the cis population. Also, who is behind the murders? Mostly black men. 0.99

00:16:07.200 That's it. That's what he said. Got suspended for that. Suspended for responding to an inaccurate claim 0.85

00:16:15.540 with some verifiable empirical facts. So what Twitter is saying is, we support this false narrative,

00:16:24.380 and if you try to debunk it, we're going to punish you. You're not allowed to debunk it. It doesn't

00:16:30.320 matter if it's not true. This is what we're going with. But the fact remains. They could suspend you

00:16:39.080 for saying it, but the fact is a fact. As I talked about a few weeks ago, sharing a piece from Chad

00:16:43.600 Felix Green over at The Federalist, the anti-trans hate crime epidemic is a fiction. It is a myth.

00:16:50.220 It's been made up. It's invented. It's not real. The vast majority of trans murder victims 1.00

00:16:56.740 are not the victims of a hate crime. The vast majority of trans murders have nothing at all to

00:17:04.180 do with bigotry or anything like that. They've mostly been the kinds of murders that you find

00:17:10.880 murdered in the non-trans population. Murdered in the same kinds of circumstances for the same 0.99

00:17:17.300 reasons. It's sad. It's terrible. But it's not a hate crime. Also, a sizable number of murder

00:17:24.680 victims among trans people are people who live a high-risk lifestyle. So prostitutes and that sort 0.73

00:17:30.540 of thing. The murder rate among prostitutes generally, trans or not, is higher than the average 0.96

00:17:36.260 population. But that's not because of anti-prostitute hate crimes. That's because you're

00:17:43.380 living a high-risk lifestyle. You're living in a world where, in a dangerous world, you're dealing

00:17:49.860 with dangerous people. You're doing a dangerous thing. That's not victim blaming. That's not saying

00:17:55.160 they deserve it, obviously, because nobody does. It's just pointing out that there's no connection here

00:18:01.540 with racism and hatred. What's driving this is something completely separate from that.

00:18:10.520 Now, it may be hate anyway, but it's not... Maybe you can make the argument that anytime somebody is

00:18:16.200 killed, there's hatred behind it, which I think is actually probably not true. I think more...

00:18:21.380 Very often, I think what lies behind murders and other crimes is a sort of indifference to human life

00:18:27.700 less than a hatred for human life, but either way. And that's just a fact.

00:18:36.520 That's all. None of this is to say that the murder rate among trans people or black people or any group

00:18:43.120 doesn't matter. Actually, I'm saying the opposite. I'm saying, let's deal with what's actually happening.

00:18:50.920 Let's deal with the reality, because only if we deal with the reality is there a chance of

00:18:57.160 making a difference. It's the people who use murder victims like political props who obviously lack

00:19:05.440 empathy and lack compassion. When you're doing that, when you're taking trans people who've been 1.00

00:19:11.780 murdered and you're turning them into a political weapon to bludgeon your opponents with, then you're

00:19:18.060 the one who lacks compassion for them.

00:19:20.920 And we're not going to be able to solve the problem. Call it an epidemic if you want. It's

00:19:28.720 not really, but whatever you want to call it, we're not going to be able to solve the problem

00:19:32.960 if we insist on diagnosing it incorrectly. It's a very basic thing. If you want to solve a problem,

00:19:40.780 whether we're talking a societal problem or a medical problem or any kind of problem,

00:19:43.720 you have to diagnose it correctly to begin with.

00:19:46.160 And so I think what Andy Ngo was trying to say, what I'm saying, what a lot of us have been saying

00:19:53.240 is, let's diagnose this problem correctly, and then we can talk about solving.

00:20:00.220 But Twitter says, no, it's better to diagnose it incorrectly. In fact, we insist that you do.

00:20:05.360 All right, let's move on to emails because there's a few topics brought up in the emails that I wanted

00:20:12.960 to spend a little bit of time on. MattWallShow at gmail.com. MattWallShow at gmail.com. This is

00:20:18.380 from Jake. Says, hey, Matt, quick talking point for tomorrow's show. As I am sure you saw, Bezos

00:20:24.120 donated $98.5 million to charity, Jeff Bezos, and that still was not enough. I saw some comments

00:20:33.680 going around that if you make $50,000, that would be the equivalent of donating $45.

00:20:39.200 My point is, I doubt all the people complaining have ever donated that $45 to any cause.

00:20:44.240 It is easy to virtue signal and demand more social programs when it is someone else's hard-earned

00:20:49.640 money. Big fan of the show. Keep up the good work and God bless. Yeah, Jake, I saw that.

00:20:54.120 Bezos donated, as you said, $98 million, and people were attacking him for it, which is

00:21:03.540 amazing. And if you want to diagnose this problem, I really think a lot of it is garden

00:21:10.000 variety jealousy. That's what a lot of it is. People clinging desperately to their narrative

00:21:18.200 of the greedy rich person. To have a rich person who also acts generously interferes with the

00:21:24.480 narrative, and so they find a way to dismiss it. And it's also, I think, that people are upset

00:21:31.300 that they themselves are not billionaires. And they look at Jeff Bezos, and their main problem

00:21:37.160 with Jeff Bezos is that they are not Jeff Bezos. They want to be him. That's what you have to

00:21:43.140 understand. All this attacking of billionaires. Most of the people doing the attacking, their main

00:21:48.640 issue with billionaires is that they themselves are not billionaires. That's what they don't like

00:21:53.820 about billionaires, is that they're not in that population. So I think, and this is unfortunately

00:22:01.300 human nature. A lot of people do that. We all do this in some way or another, to some degree or another,

00:22:06.380 where, you know, you see someone who's got something you want, and their life seems to be

00:22:15.980 working for them well. And you feel jealous, you're envious. And so you want to tell yourself

00:22:22.900 that there's something wrong with them. And that's what people do. I think a lot of these socialists

00:22:28.840 and everything, these would-be, faux socialists, they look at rich people, and really in their heart,

00:22:34.880 they want to be rich, but they're not. And so instead they tell themselves, oh, well, you know,

00:22:41.380 these are all a bunch of greedy, these are all a bunch of greedy bastards. And, you know, 1.00

00:22:47.840 at least I'm not like that. At least I'm a better person. They might have more money than me,

00:22:53.100 but I'm a better, more virtuous person. And then when you see that the billionaire isn't greedy,

00:22:58.300 and they're donating a lot of money and doing a lot of good in the community,

00:23:00.980 now they're thinking, wait a second, is this person richer than me and better?

00:23:07.160 That can't be. They can't be richer and more generous. I can't allow that to be the case.

00:23:12.940 And I agree with you. All these people saying, oh, Bezos giving $98 million is like me giving 50.

00:23:20.320 Well, first of all, no, it isn't. Because I'm pretty sure the charity would prefer the 98 million

00:23:25.200 to the 50. Okay. It makes a difference to them. There are practical things that $98 million can do

00:23:33.060 that $50 cannot. Now, if all you have to give is 50 and you give the 50, it's like the parable that

00:23:37.860 Jesus told the woman that just gave, you know, put two coins into the, you know, at the synagogue

00:23:42.280 rather than the rich people that made a show of giving more. So yes, in terms of the moral act

00:23:50.140 itself, the moral significance, if you give less and that's all you can give, that's a great thing.

00:23:55.400 And it does make a difference, but it obviously, practically speaking, $98 million, that's going

00:24:03.360 to help a lot of hungry and homeless people. Whereas $50 will help a lot less. So in a practical

00:24:10.140 sense, it's not as good. But also I agree with you in that all these people saying, well, it's like

00:24:18.440 if I gave 50. Are you giving 50 though? If you are, great, but I kind of doubt that you are.

00:24:28.060 These people complaining about rich people all the time and greedy and everything.

00:24:33.580 Every time they see philanthropy among rich people, they find a way of dismissing it.

00:24:38.300 All these people that say, oh, you know, I, that's not as generous as I can be. Well,

00:24:44.160 are you generous? Are you actually giving your money to charity? I tend to doubt it. I think

00:24:53.800 a lot of these people are, are hoarding their own money. And that's what really gets them

00:24:58.720 is that they know in their hearts that even though they're a lot poorer than someone like

00:25:04.960 Jeff Bezos, than a billionaire, they have a lot less money. They're actually more greedy

00:25:10.120 because that's the thing. If you're making, you know, $70,000 a year or something and you give

00:25:19.040 none of it to charity and you don't help anybody with it. Um, and meanwhile, you've got a billionaire

00:25:28.340 giving millions. The billionaire is more generous than you. And yeah, you could say he's got more

00:25:33.640 money to spend, but you're giving nothing. You're not doing anything. I mean, you could spare some of

00:25:37.340 that. I mean, 70,000 is not 70 billion, but it's, it's, there's still, you still have some room,

00:25:44.940 like maybe a few of the coffees you buy at Starbucks. Maybe, maybe you don't get that iPhone

00:25:49.940 upgrade. You know, maybe you already have Netflix. You don't need Amazon too. You could sacrifice some

00:25:56.660 of that and give to the less fortunate, but you don't because you're actually more materialistic and

00:26:01.300 greedier than some of those rich people. And I think that's what really gets them. They hate to think

00:26:06.820 that. Oh my gosh. Am I, am I not only broke, but greedy too? No, nobody wants to think that

00:26:15.380 about themselves. All right. Um, that's one thing I've, I've talked about before you see

00:26:23.720 in our culture and our consumeristic culture, uh, consumeristic isn't really a word, but let's go

00:26:31.700 with it. What you find is that even people who are not rich, like me and you, assuming you're not

00:26:40.380 rich, who's ever watching this, a lot of us have sort of inherited the vices of the rich

00:26:46.560 because living in this consumerist culture, even people who aren't rich can tend to be materialistic,

00:26:55.360 greedy, just hoarding goods and things for themselves. And so a lot of us, we have the

00:27:03.140 vices of the rich. We have the greed and the materialism, but we don't actually have the riches

00:27:07.300 of the rich. And so we've got the worst of all the worlds. Okay. This is from Marie says, I'm a young

00:27:14.440 mom of two little toddlers and my two and a half year old is really pumped for Santa to come this

00:27:18.700 year. I've told her the true meaning of Christmas and I basically made Santa a helper for Jesus.

00:27:22.900 Emphasis on helper. So she'll still get the point. I've never thought of not giving her the fantasy

00:27:27.820 of Santa until talking with a friend recently. The friend said that her parents made Santa very real

00:27:32.480 with noises on the roof, jingle bells and everything. So when she found out that all that hope and joyful

00:27:37.620 anticipation was complete nonsense, she was devastated. She still is devastated and refuses

00:27:41.620 to tell her kids about Santa. I've had a few friends experience something similar. It makes me sad.

00:27:46.660 What have you done for your kids? Are you ever worried about the day that they inevitably discover

00:27:50.340 the fantasy of Santa Claus? I'm at a crossroads of what to do because both pose their pros and cons.

00:27:55.060 I'd love your opinion. You're a great dad. Thank you for all your talk, for all you talk about. I'm

00:27:59.740 so disappointed in the sexualized obsession of the young in our culture. Never stop speaking. You make

00:28:03.460 such a difference. God bless you and your family. Yeah, Marie, first of all, I would say about your

00:28:09.460 friend, it seems like their parents went way overboard, but if she's still devastated that Santa Claus isn't

00:28:16.160 real, it might be time for her to get over that one. You know, we all went through that as kids and

00:28:21.080 it was a little difficult at first, but probably by the time you're an adult, you should be over it.

00:28:25.840 I don't know. I know maybe you can't say that to her. Maybe you should just say it to her. Just put it

00:28:30.440 flat out. Next time she's complaining about the fact that Santa Claus doesn't exist, maybe say to her,

00:28:35.420 listen, you know that you're like 30, right? But in terms of what to tell your kids,

00:28:42.480 here's the way that I look at it.

00:28:46.160 And I've, I've brought this point up many times before when talking about gender issues and kids

00:28:50.740 choosing their own gender and everything. My point is that very young kids, you say you're toddlers.

00:28:56.760 Okay. Two and a half years old. Well, a two and a half year old has no idea what reality is.

00:29:03.340 It has no concept of reality. Doesn't know the difference between fiction and truth and fiction.

00:29:09.640 So if you were to say to your two and a half year old, Santa Claus is not real.

00:29:15.120 That wouldn't mean anything anyway.

00:29:19.140 So my point is you couldn't convince a two and a half year old that there is no such thing as Santa

00:29:25.120 Claus because a phrase like there's no such thing as just doesn't mean anything for them. They don't

00:29:30.220 have the cognitive ability to understand that. And so that's why children naturally live in a fantasy

00:29:39.400 world. Um, you're two and a half year old. If you have a three-year-old, a four-year-old,

00:29:44.140 they also probably think that Spider-Man exists and Superman exists and they watch Bugs Bunny.

00:29:48.820 You know, they think that that's real. They watch cartoons. They think it's real. It's not because

00:29:52.040 you've told them that you haven't gone out of your way to convince. Nobody goes out of their way

00:29:56.060 really to convince a four-year-old that Spider-Man exists. But if they see Spider-Man on TV, if they watch a

00:30:01.580 movie, they're going to think that's real because the whole idea that you could be watching something

00:30:08.500 in image, but it's not real. It just, that's, there's a disconnect there because they think,

00:30:14.440 well, what do you mean? It's not real. I can see it. Of course it's real.

00:30:16.360 So I wouldn't worry about it. I guess is what I'm saying. If your kids are young enough where

00:30:24.980 believing in Santa is appropriate, then they're also so young that you couldn't convince them

00:30:31.520 anyway that Santa Claus isn't real. So you might as well just go with it. And as they get older and

00:30:37.580 they're capable of understanding that there is this thing, that there is reality, which is set apart in

00:30:45.400 some way from fantasy. As they get older, when they get to be, you know, five, six, seven, they start to

00:30:50.520 understand that. Then they're getting to the age maybe where I think you break the news. But also, they're

00:30:59.860 also getting to the age where they're going to, they're going to start figuring that out anyway. In fact, for

00:31:04.660 me with Santa Claus, I actually, I actually did not have the devastating moment where my parents sat me down

00:31:11.240 and gave me the bad news. I kind of just figured it out on, on my own because I had older siblings and

00:31:18.840 they had stopped believing. And so just over time, you're just kind of like, oh, okay, hold on a second.

00:31:23.320 And you start piecing it together. So if you told, if you told your kid, if you told your kid nothing at

00:31:29.620 all about Santa Claus, you didn't, you didn't say real or fake or anything. You just didn't say anything

00:31:35.240 about it. I think your child at a young age would naturally believe in Santa Claus because he would

00:31:41.380 pick it up from his friends and from the culture and from TV and everything. And then, you know,

00:31:45.560 around six, seven, eight would stop believing. And that would happen apart from you completely.

00:31:51.820 So all you're doing as a parent is maybe hurrying it along a little bit or, you know, kind of guiding

00:31:56.660 them one way or another a little bit. But kids are going to live in that fantasy world. And there's also

00:32:01.820 nothing wrong with that. So if you, if you would not, I say, we don't, we don't go out of our way

00:32:08.880 to convince our kids that Spider-Man is real yet. They do believe that Spider-Man is real. Would you,

00:32:15.240 would you sit them down and go out of your way to convince them that Spider-Man isn't real?

00:32:20.720 Would anyone, would any parent do that? Why? Your daughter believes that there are fairies in the

00:32:25.580 garden. Are you going to sit her down and say, listen, there are no fairies. Stop believing in fairies. 1.00

00:32:30.400 What kind of crazy parent would do that? No, she believes it. Just let her believe it. 0.98

00:32:35.560 Now. Yeah. You play along a little bit and cause it's fun and she's a kid. She's just, who cares?

00:32:41.580 All right. We'll do one more. This is from

00:32:43.900 Zach says, dear Matt, since the Christmas season essentially starts on Friday,

00:32:48.200 please rate the following five gifts from one to five, five being the worst.

00:32:52.880 Socks, a worn slash used item. That's clearly been re-gifted. Scratch off lottery tickets,

00:32:59.480 a Christmas ornament or a clothing item that is clearly two sizes too small and comes with a gift

00:33:04.540 receipt. Thanks for all you do and watch the show religiously. Well, I need more information,

00:33:08.980 Zach, because you talk about socks. Are the socks, the fancy high-end socks that you buy,

00:33:13.480 you get a pair of them for 14 bucks at Target. That for me is fancy and high-end.

00:33:18.700 That's not a bad gift. I have no problem with re-gifted items in principle. Now, if you're saying

00:33:23.720 they've been worn or obviously used, okay, if someone's giving me a blender that still has chunks of

00:33:27.980 smoothie in it, I'm going to have an issue with that. But re-gifted in general, I have no problem

00:33:32.940 with. Now, you talk about ornaments. Okay, that's definitely a five. That's a 20, really.

00:33:39.720 If five is the worst, then 20, it's a 20. It's off the scales bad. Ornaments are the worst gifts.

00:33:47.820 We've all been guilty of giving Christmas ornaments as gifts to other people, yet we all know

00:33:54.040 that none of us want Christmas ornaments as gifts. So we all participate in this thing where

00:33:59.000 we give a gift that we know we wouldn't want. You know, Jesus says, do unto others as you would

00:34:06.200 have them do unto you. Well, give gifts that you would want also in some world. Nobody wants a

00:34:12.080 Christmas ornament. You get this little thing, a little ball or whatever that you hang on a tree

00:34:18.200 for a few weeks along with all the other ornaments. It just gets lost in the shuffle. Who's going to be

00:34:23.680 excited about that? And the worst thing is, and this is why gift giving stresses me out, and I would

00:34:29.060 be in favor of just abolishing all gift giving occasions and just never giving or receiving any

00:34:34.320 gifts. I'd be fine with that. What stresses me out is you're sitting there on Christmas morning and

00:34:38.160 you're doing your family gift unwrapping thing and you get a gift like an ornament and it's

00:34:44.240 obviously super lame and you don't care about it, but you have to act excited because the person who

00:34:50.400 gave it to you is sitting right there. Even though they know, unless it's a child, okay, that's an

00:34:55.820 exception here. But if it's an adult, they know that you're not going to be super psyched about the

00:34:59.700 ornament, but they still expect you to act like you are and they know you're faking it. And so there's

00:35:05.640 this, the psychological back and forth, the mind games that are being played. I don't like it.

00:35:13.000 And I'm very bad at faking enthusiasm. So I open up the ornament and I have to go, oh, cool. That's

00:35:21.440 the best I can do. Oh, cool. Is that an ornament? You got an ornament? Yeah. Oh yeah, this'll look

00:35:26.160 great on the tree. This'll look great with the 300 other ornaments. I'll just put that in there and

00:35:30.100 I'll forget about it. It's great. No, thank you so much. Wow. Wow. Where'd you get this? Where'd you?

00:35:34.920 You have to ask a few questions, right? That's the one way I sell it. To try to distract from the

00:35:39.320 fact that I'm not excited, I'll start asking questions. Where'd you get this from? Oh, you got

00:35:42.880 it from the mall. Wow. What mall? Oh, wow. Wow. Look at this ornament. Oh my gosh. I woke up this

00:35:52.300 morning just hoping I'd get an ornament. I got 600 ornaments. I was thinking I need another one. I mean,

00:35:57.580 I need a 601 ornament. So thank you so much for this ornament. Thank you so much for it.

00:36:04.920 You obviously hate me. Could give me a gift that I want. How about just a gift card? You wanted to

00:36:11.900 spend seven bucks on a gift. So just get a $7 gift card to Starbucks. Okay. That'd be much better.

00:36:18.540 I got to actually use that. That's my reaction. It's Christmas morning. It's awkward at my house.

00:36:29.420 Anyway, that's my feeling about that. Thanks for the question. I think we'll wrap it up there.

00:36:32.820 Thanks, everybody, for watching. Godspeed.

00:36:37.800 If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to subscribe. And if you want to help spread the

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00:36:45.120 on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you listen to podcasts. Also, be sure to check out the other

00:36:50.280 Daily Wire podcasts, including The Ben Shapiro Show, Michael Knowles Show, and The Andrew Klavan Show.

00:36:55.200 Thanks for listening.

00:36:55.860 If you prefer facts over feelings, aren't offended by the brutal truth, and you can still laugh at the

00:37:22.060 insanity filling our national news cycle, well, tune in to The Ben Shapiro Show. We'll get a whole lot

00:37:26.600 of that and much more. See you there.

The Matt Walsh Show - November 26, 2019

Ep. 379 - The War On Facts

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